


Over, All Over Again

by storry_eyed



Category: The West Wing
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-03
Updated: 2014-11-03
Packaged: 2018-02-24 00:02:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,676
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2560634
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/storry_eyed/pseuds/storry_eyed
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Josh is pretty sure someone’s going to figure it out this time, because the minute he hears Lisa Sherborne is going to be doing a piece on Sam his face turned white and he had to sit down while they kept talking all around him. A rewrite of Season 3 Episode 11, "100,000 Airplanes".</p>
            </blockquote>





	Over, All Over Again

Josh is pretty sure someone’s going to figure it out this time, because the minute he hears Lisa Sherborne is going to be doing a piece on Sam his face turned white and he had to sit down while they kept talking all around him, CJ and Toby and Donna and Bonnie and Ginger, their voices high above his head while he tried to breathe. There had been so many close calls, so many times on the campaign when they had snuck between each other’s rooms and kissed behind closed doors and so many more times in the White House, even though it was over between them in deed at least, when he had wanted to hug Sam a little more tightly or brush his fingers against the back of Sam’s hand or smile a little brighter when Sam did well on a speech, but he held himself back because they had agreed they wouldn’t risk their careers over this - and after it all, after all the heartbreak, they were going to be outed by Sam’s ex-fiance. He wished he could laugh.

Sam was the one who noticed. Of course it was Sam. He must have appeared in the bullpen at some point, because suddenly his voice was saying “Josh? Josh?” and Josh was staring at Sam’s and Toby’s faces in his vision, Toby’s confused, Sam’s concerned.

“You told him Lisa’s doing a piece?”

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

“Why wouldn’t we?”

“Josh-”

“So Lisa’s doing a piece on you, huh? For Vanity Fair?” Josh went for the laugh but it just sounded like a wheeze. “Must suck.”

“Josh, can I talk to-”

“Look, I - I’ve got a lot of work to do, I’ll see you.” He couldn’t get out of there fast enough, and he didn’t have the courage to turn around look at Sam’s expression, to try to read him, even though he desperately wanted to.

So of course Sam followed him, straight into his office, so that when Josh tried to slam the door behind him, he just ended up hitting Sam with it and then they both ended up in the office, breathing hard, avoiding looking at each other, avoiding everything.

“Look, Josh, I wanted to tell you myself, but obviously they got to you first, so-”

“Sam, she’s going to tell.” Josh’s voice was calm.

“No, she isn’t.” Sam wished he was as confident as he had tried to make his voice sound.

“She will. She’ll be famous.”

“Lisa doesn’t care about being famous.”

Josh snorted. “Right. Why didn’t you just say no?”

“You honestly think I didn’t try that?! This wasn’t my idea, Josh! CJ told me it was happening, I tried to talk her out of it; I couldn’t! I didn’t exactly want to tell her why I was objecting so strongly!”

Josh rubbed his forehead. “Yeah. Yeah. Look, I’m sorry.”

“Yeah.” 

“Josh, what went wrong between us?”

Josh huffed a laugh. “Nothing went wrong between us, we won the White House and our lives got put on display for the whole world to see. So we couldn’t keep doing - whatever it was we’d been doing.”

Sam’s jaw clenched. “Whatever it was we’d been doing?”

“Come on, Sam, you didn’t really think it was that serious-”

“I loved you,” Sam hissed, and watched the astonishment paint Josh’s face. “I gave up everything, did you really think it meant nothing to me?”

He was yelling now, waving his arms in hysteria. “I gave up my job and my fiance and my life and sleep and I didn’t give it up for Bartlet, I gave it up for you! I was relieved when Lisa found us because it meant I could drop the facade! And we would have been together, we would have been good, and then you came up with the bright and idiotic idea that we would be jeopardizing the Administration if we kept on with it, never mind that the President managed to hide having MS for the first two and a half years he was in office, and you ended it and damn it all because I still love you anyway.”

Josh’s fingers rose to hover inches away from Sam’s cheek as Sam gasped for breath and hoped his eyes didn’t shine too brightly. Josh opened his mouth to speak and then the door banged open and Donna rushed in and Josh jumped away and it was over all over again.

~~~

Having Lisa around was weird. And distracting. And it made Sam nervous. So nervous, in fact, that even blaming it on the speech didn’t work. He was dropping things and forgetting things and trailing off in the middle of sentences and he couldn’t explain why, couldn’t tell anyone anything, and he hadn’t even seen Josh all night when that was the one thing that might have calmed him down.

But the poll numbers were okay, better than okay, thank God, and they were all celebrating, and Sam was going to get the chance to wrap his arms around Josh where Lisa couldn’t see them but instead CJ picked him up and twirled him around and by the time he got his bearings back the president was there and Josh was nowhere to be seen.

Lisa wanted to talk to him.

“Sam, I’m going to give my notes to someone else and let them finish the piece.” He was relieved, unbelievably grateful, but there was this guilt, seeping into him, or maybe it had never really gone away. He had thought he’d loved her, until Josh walked back into his life dripping wet and face as bright and alive as the sun and there could never have been anyone else.

He led her into his office and closed the door gently. “Lisa, look, you don’t have to-”

“Sam. You hate having me here. And every time I see Josh I think he’s going to start yelling at me - and then he starts yelling at someone else, so I know I’m right. The last thing I want to do is drive a wedge between you. I shouldn’t have come back, so let me get out of your life and you won’t have to hear from me again.”

“Believe me, you aren’t.”

Lisa frowned. “What do you mean?”

“Josh thought you were going to out us, you know.”

“Sam, I would never do that, but what’s wrong? What’s going on that I don’t know?”

She’s the wrong person, he shouldn’t be telling her this, but the truth is there’s no one else he can tell and all of a sudden it came spilling out of him - “Josh broke up with me.”

The words are trivial, they’re so wrong because Josh didn’t break up with him, they were supposed to be immortal and Josh shattered that dream that had shone so bright with Bartlet’s election; they had been on top of the world and then everything had crumbled and Sam had been trying to put the pieces back together with Scotch tape ever since. Josh didn’t break up with him, Josh left him standing alone and broke his heart. 

Lisa’s eyes widened and then her arms were around Sam and she was rocking them both back and forth, and Sam didn’t care that anyone could see them through the open blinds in his office, he didn’t care that his ex-fiance was comforting him, he didn’t care about anything except somehow managing to keep the tears in his eyes from escaping. He loses the battle just once and one runs down his face, leaving a scalding trail in its wake.

Lisa pulled back and patted his arm awkwardly, and just like that they’re back to how they used to be, never quite sure what each of them wanted from the other. Sam coughed.

“Sorry.”

She shook her head, but there were tears in her eyes too. “Do you know where Josh is?”

There was a knock on the door. Sam jumped and was about to ask for another minute when the door opened anyway, of course it did, because it was Toby and his face was the perfect expression of shock and surprise and suspicion but all he said was, “Sam, Josh is looking for you.”

“Good,” snapped Lisa, taking Sam by surprise, and then his stomach jumped into his throat and he managed to get out “No, Lisa, don’t-” before she was pushing past Toby and stomping out of Sam’s office to find a nervous Josh hanging around outside, Sam hot on her heels.

“Lisa, whatever you’re going to do, please don’t-”

“What in the hell is going-”

“Sam, I really need to talk to-”

“Josh Lyman, you are pathetic.”

Everything stopped.

Lisa turned bright red and Sam could see whatever speech she had prepared fly out of her head. She wasn’t cut out for any of this, really.

With nothing else to do, she pointed at Josh. “Fix it.” Lisa looked around at the room full of people. “It was nice meeting you all.”

She made to walk out of the room, but instead turned around and kissed Sam on the cheek. “Take care of yourself.” Then she was gone.

There was a very long silence. Sam’s face was very red and he was afraid that his eyes were still glistening noticeably. Josh had turned white yet again and was staring at Sam as though he could figure out the secrets of the universe from the lines in Sam’s face.

Then people started to move again; Toby went into his office and slammed the door, CJ started talking to Ginger about some report she needed from the communications office, and Josh walked straight up to Sam, grabbed his hand, pulled him into his office, shut the blinds, and said “I love you, too. I didn’t mean to hurt you, I swear.” He looked like he was about to faint, but he said it.

“Yeah,” said Sam, more exhausted than he had ever thought possible, and kissed him.

When they pulled apart, there were no apologies. There was nothing left they could say.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to all who read.


End file.
